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I recently got the chance to sit down with Brian Beckman, physicist, programmer and
Channel 9 celebrity, to learn about the history of computing. As you know, Brian is a great teacher. This lesson focuses on the evolution of computing devices and delves into some of the not-so-obvious uses of hand-held programmable calculators in the not-so-distant
past.

Did you know that the 1975
Apollo Soyuz international space mission incorporated a programmable calculator, the
HP-65, to calculate precise course corrections for the rendezvous and linking of Apollo and Soyuz space crafts? A calculator!! Indeed, programmable calculators are the predecessors of today's computers. But what
came before the hand-held computing titans of the 70s? What was the first computer?

Brian has quite a collection of computing devices in his office, some of which, as expected, predate digital devices. We get a look at these and learn about their place in history.

Of course, Brian is a software developer with uncanny capability for designing accurate simulations (remember the
Forza math interview?) so he decided to write an innovative application that simulates the HP-97, precisely. Brian works on the Data Programmability team (SQL, LINQ, Entity Framework, etc) so he implemented the HP-97's
programmability and storage in ADO.NET and SQL. Brian will be producing a
C9 Screencast to dig into what he did, so look for this showing up soon!

As always, it was a pleasure to converse with Brian and learn about how computers got to where they are today. It's a long interview, so get comfortable, relax, and learn from a master.

I actually wrote my first program on the HP calculator with memory cards around 1980.

Brings back memories of a similar kind, in 1983 I was in high school and wrote a simulator of a NORD-100 (mini computer from Norsk Data) using Microsoft MBasic (when Microsoft was a somewhat more modest outfit) that ran on a MP/M terminal based Mycron machine
running a 80186 processor.

Brian is very busy, so I can't promise a regular show (as you can imagine, his team relies on his engineering skills to ship products)... However, as you see, I've given him
his own tag When time permits and good topics arise (no problems here!), you will see more Brian on C9.

Great video! I really like all of Brianbec's stuffs. If you have a guy at Microsoft with such deep knowledge of computing and calculators, why did not you implement the sqrt function in the scientific mode of Windows calculator? Anybody noticed it's
available in normal mode only?

I really like stuff like this. Since I am watching Channel 9 for hours on end (while I am working) I am through anything that peaks my interest and almost anything that doesn't.

There really should be a Brian Beckman show (and also a Jeffrey Snover and Scott Guthrie show for that matter. although you probably should let him have a long vacation first! he looks like a two year crunch at least)

we are having a very long thread on the MFC newsgroup about floating point numbers, precisions, how to compare them, discussions about significant digits, why "25/30*30 - 1" is not 0 in float, how to increase precision, etc.

Could you please use your talent for teaching and explaining things and your math knowledge and background to discuss in a Channel9 interview about topics like floating point numbers, how computers store them, how to *correctly* manage them, how can
we use arbitrary precision (if possible), difference between Decimal and
Float, how Windows calculator works, a BIGNUM class, etc. ?

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